Emily (on the way home from school in the car): Mommy? What happens when we stop counting?
Me (listening to NPR): What do you mean? Counting what?
Emily: Mommy! No! I mean, when the numbers stop? What happens when the numbers stop?
Me (recalling an earlier conversation about infinite sets): Oh! You mean how the numbers keep going and you could just keep counting forever.
Emily: But even if you kept counting forever you couldn't get to the end.
Me: Right. They just keep going.
Emily: But how do you know what number is next?
Me (back to NPR again): Um?
Emily: How do you know what number comes next when you keep counting and counting?
Me: Well, the numbers always happen one after another, like 16 thousand, four hundred and four and then 16 thousand, four hundred and five.
Emily: But you couldn't ever count them all?
Me: Nope. Even if you counted all the time your whole life. They even have computers that count numbers really fast and the computers haven't gotten to the end. Because there's no end.
Emily: This is the computer counting (robot voice): 1234567891011121314
Later, when tucking them in for bed (at 7:45 pm, hee hee):
Penny: No hug! No kiss! (throwing covers over her head dramatically)
Daddy: Okay, Good night then!
Penny: No! No! Huggy! Kissy!
Me (hugging Penny first because I was closer): Good night, Penny!
Penny (after kissing me somberly on the lips): I will miss you, too, Mommy.
4 years ago
2 comments:
They're a stitch. Love hearing about what kids are saying.
G reat Ha llowe en p ics too - sorry for the one of Emily that got away. (P.S. - The extra spaces were courtesy of Caroline's flailing hands -- she always goes for the space bar.)
When I was her age, I remember being confused how to count past 29. I'd count, twenty-ten, twenty-eleven, etc, until I hit twenty-twenty. I couldn't wrap my mind around it.
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